Angela Merkel against gay marriage, in favor of union of 'man & woman'

In her first ever YouTube interview Angela Merkel has said she does not believe that gay couples should have the right to marry. "For me, personally, marriage is the coexistence between a man and a woman," she told Florian Mundt, aka LeFloid.

"I am for registered civil partnerships. I am for our not having any discrimination in tax legislation. And wherever we still find discrimination, we will continue to dismantle it," the German Chancellor pledged in her first-ever YouTube interview, according to Deutsche Welle.

“We have come a long way; when I remember, 25 years ago, many people didn’t dare to say that they are gay or lesbian.”

"Luckily we overcame this; you can enter a partnership, a civil partnership,” Merkel added.

According to a poll published in 2013 nearly three quarters of Germans support same-sex marriage, Reuters reported. The survey for RTL television and Stern magazine showed that as many as 74 percent of Germans supported the idea of allowing homosexuals to marry, with only 23 percent against.

Germany began to recognize civil unions of same-sex couples in 2001. However, they are not recognized as being “married” and are not allowed to jointly adopt children.

A spokesman for the British LGBT charity, Stonewall, responded to the Chancellor's latest comments, saying: "Can someone really support ‘eliminating all discrimination’ if they believe that same-sex unions shouldn’t be labelled as ‘marriages’? It must be a quiet week for Angela if her current concern is synonyms," he added.

LeFloid, a YouTube star, asked his 2.6 million subscribers to supply him with questions to "chat a bit with Angela." Those who expected LeFloid to grill the Chancellor with taxing questions were left disappointed, with many users slamming the 27-year-old for being too soft.

According to Deutsche Welle, both LeFloid and the government insisted that he was given a carte blanche in choosing the questions and editing the 30-minute chat, which took place on Friday and aired on Monday.

The activist and blogger Markus Beckedahl (@netzpolitik) lashed out at LeFloid, saying "very cool" as the default response to Merkel's “meaningless statements is rather uncool.” Merkel's interview on YouTube has been generally viewed as a chance to win support among younger audiences.

The German government's official YouTube channel, Bundesregierung, which was launched in 2011, only boasts some 13,000 subscribers, while Merkel's weekly podcasts usually accumulate between 800 and 2,000 clicks.